


Trickster’s Due: The Cost of Shame

by Reyka_Sivao



Category: Star Trek
Genre: Academic, Essays, Gen, Pon Farr, Vulcan, Vulcan Biology, Vulcan Culture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-19
Updated: 2019-10-19
Packaged: 2020-12-24 04:56:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21093761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reyka_Sivao/pseuds/Reyka_Sivao
Summary: An in-universe academic essay discussing the intersection of Vulcans and the Trickster archetype and pon farr as the cost of emotional control.





	Trickster’s Due: The Cost of Shame

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [From The Terran Coyote to The Klingon K'Ortar: Tricksters of the Alpha and Beta Quadrants](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/528341) by ljc. 

**Introduction: T’Kay and the Trickster Archetype**

_ And that is how T'Kay let Fire loose in the World, and made the Forge. _

The Trickster is a complex figure in the mythologies of the Alpha and Beta quadrants, neither wholly good nor wholly evil, by turns benevolent and vicious. 

The primary trickster in pan-Vulcan mythology is a figure named  _ T’Kay. _ She is credited with such feats as releasing fire and burning the world, causing her lover’s blood to burn for her every seven years, and being the first to hide her soul in a stone to cheat death--a practice still followed by many modern Vulcans who choose to have their  _ katra _ preserved on the brink of death.

The degree to which such figures are praised or shamed depends greatly on the culture they are spoken into, and T’Kay, being of the stoic Vulcans, is among the least revered of her compatriots. Nevertheless, her stories are still told, and the lens of the trickster is still very much relevant and useful to analyze modern mainstream Vulcan culture.

**Shame and Guilt**

Another essential dualism we shall have to define is the distinction between  _ shame  _ and  _ guilt. _

This is, perhaps, best defined as a spectrum. On the one end, we have  _ shame-- _ people will see!--and on the other,  _ guilt-- _ an internal sense of one’s actions as being in line with one’s social identity or not. While there is, of course, significant overlap, cultures most often lean toward one or the other.

Vulcan, in general, leans towards the  _ shame _ side of the spectrum. Their famed emotional control is, as they will admit when pressed, primarily a matter of rejecting emotional  _ expression-- _ most adult Vulcans have not reached the  _ Kolinahr  _ level of meditative control, in which the entire self is divorced from physical response to emotion.

In practice, this leads to a highly developed sense of when others will  _ observe  _ one’s emotional responses, rather than a rejection of the emotions themselves. 

**Cultural Strictures and the Fool’s Day**

Now, in most cultures in the alpha quadrant, things follow a basic pattern: The stricter the general social mores of the society, the more important and elaborate the festival of the fool becomes.

The festival of the fool, in general terms, describes a day or other span of time in which the usual rules of society are upturned--the lowest are treated as honored, the honored serve the masses, the rules of gender and class are ignored and inverted. In generally egalitarian societies, there may be some surface level holiday, but its importance it usually overshadowed by other festivals.

However, in more socially rigid environments, the festival of the fool provides a vital social release valve.

**The Necessity of Release/The Breaking Point**

Vulcan, unusually among alpha and beta quadrant cultures, is both highly socially rigid and also lacks any semblance of the Fool’s Festival.

According to mainstream Vulcan publications of the matter, this is due to Vulcans’ highly developed emotional control and meditative practices.

However, this is a somewhat dubious claim. While meditative efforts may potentially prove a sufficient release valve on an individual level, on a societal level, there are simply too many factors at play to trust that is will suffice for even a simple plurality of the members of that society.

So then, if Vulcan culture has high strictness and low release, where then is the breaking point?

Although it is culturally sanctioned to speak of, the most important breaking point of Vulcan’s famed strictness is not social, but personal.

_ Pon farr _ , the Vulcan time of mating, is characterized by a complete loss of control, extreme emotional swings, and inability to conceal any of it except by physically removing oneself from society. It is the one time that emotional expression is excused and politely ignored.

This in turn becomes the primary release valve from the strictures of Vulcan society. But unlike in other cultures, it is not something to be celebrated as a holiday, but hidden away in shame.

As mentioned in the introduction, T’Kay the Trickster is credited--or blamed--with having originated the Vulcan mating cycle. If one wishes to be poetic, one could almost say that pon farr is both Trickster’s Gift and Trickster’s Curse.

It is a gift, in that it is the one reason Vulcan’s stoicism can maintain its reputation, by forcing a private release valve in place of a public one. But it is also a curse, leaving trauma and death in its wake for the unlucky.

Most cultures prefer to provide the trickster a ritualized space to work her havoc, but it is still entirely possible, if ill-advised, to attempt to lock her out entirely.

One way or another, Trickster always receives her due. 


End file.
